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Airline intelligence / Virgin Atlantic

Virgin Atlantic was first to let a generative AI engine set and publish its fares

Virgin Atlantic became the first airline to use Fetcherr's generative pricing engine in 2023, letting it forecast demand, set fares and publish them to every sales channel without manual steps. At launch it priced selected routes. Neither company has published results.

The operating picture

Pricing without the manual steps

Virgin Atlantic Airbus A330-900 G-VEII IAD VA1
Virgin Atlantic Airbus A330-900 G-VEII IAD VA1. Photograph: Acroterion / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped to fit). Illustrates the airline, not an AI deployment.

Airline pricing has traditionally relied on fare classes and rules set by revenue analysts. Fetcherr's engine instead adjusts fares up or down from its predictions of market conditions, monitoring the network around the clock.

WestJet, Azul, Viva Aerobus and Royal Air Maroc later joined Fetcherr's airline customers. Virgin Atlantic's other technology record, IBA asset valuations, does not involve AI.

Selected implementations

The work behind the evidence

01 / Deployed · limited scope

Fares set and published by AI

The operational problem

Fares on long haul routes must respond to demand, competitors and unsold seats, and every manual step between a pricing decision and the fare on sale costs time.

What the evidence reports

Fetcherr announced in July 2023, PhocusWire reported, that Virgin Atlantic was the first airline to adopt Fetcherr's generative pricing engine, which forecasts demand and seat inventory, suggests fare changes to recover missed revenue and pushes new fares to all sales channels in real time. It can lower the price on a flight with many unsold seats. The system was live and pricing selected routes. Chris Wilkinson, vice president of airline pricing and revenue management, said the partnership "offers a major advancement in pricing technology beyond traditional segmentation".

Operational significance

Pricing is where an airline's revenue is decided, and Virgin Atlantic handed part of it to a generative AI model before any other airline.

Evidence still needed

Neither company has published revenue results or said how many routes the engine now prices.

Sources and verification (2)

PhocusWire - Virgin Atlantic partners with Fetcherr on AI-driven pricing model · Evidence grade B

Fetcherr press release (via Yahoo Finance/Accesswire) - Virgin Atlantic GPE · Evidence grade B

A source can verify an announcement without verifying its projected outcome.

The wider register

Other tracked activity

Other records are shown separately, including non-AI technology and programmes at different stages of deployment. A register entry does not establish a measured AI benefit.

IBA aircraft and asset valuations for Virgin Atlantic · Deployed · limited scope

Virgin Atlantic says in a testimonial on IBA's website that it has worked with IBA for a number of years on valuations of aircraft and other assets, including airport slots and spare-parts inventory.

Sources and verification (1)

IBA Group consulting page (Virgin Atlantic testimonial) · Evidence grade B

A source can verify an announcement without verifying its projected outcome.

Editorial assessment

Virgin Atlantic's documented AI is a pioneering pricing deployment, on a limited set of routes at launch.

Evidence of how far the engine now runs across the network, and what it has done to revenue, would show whether the early bet paid off.

Live data from the Aerostack register. Status reflects published evidence only. See Our approach for how records are graded.

Aerostack tracks AI deployments across airports and airlines, with the published evidence behind each record. Photography is real aviation imagery. Record thumbnails may show the named airport or airline; other photographs do not.